This invention relates to methods of and apparatus for stuffing foodstuff into a casing, more particularly a method and apparatus for stuffing foodstuffs such as sausage meat or hams which are to be cured by smoking into a casing of fibrous material suitable for the smoking of the foodstuff.
The invention is especially concerned with the stuffing of sausage meat into a casing of fibrous material such as presently widely used for sausage meat which is to be smoked, but is also concerned with the stuffing of other foodstuffs, such as hams, for example, into such a casing.
Conventionally, the operation of stuffing sausage meat into a casing of fibrous material suitable for the smoking of the sausage has been carried out with equipment comprising an extruder having a pump for pumping sausage meat through a horizontal pump nozzle or stuffing tube, the casing being supplied as pre-formed tube stock (generally approximately 50-80 feet long), each such 50-80 foot length being shirred or rucked to be in collapsed accordion-pleated condition with the total length of the shirred casing about 15 inches. The 15 inch length of shirred casing is slipped over the stuffing tube and trained through a sizing ring and into a clipping mechanism, in which its leading end is clipped closed by a metal clip. Sausage meat is extruded into the casing, pushing it forward off the stuffing tube, and after a predetermined guantity of sausage meat, the amount for one sausage or "chub" or "loaf" as it is called, has been stuffed into the casing, a clip is applied. Then another clip is applied generally about one inch away, and the procedure repeated until a string of sausages ("chubs" or "loaves") comprising a desired number of sausages ("chubs" or "loaves") is completed (e.g. three or four sausages), at which point a knife cuts off the string between a pair of the one-inch-spaced clips. A cord may be provided for each string of sausages when the desired count (i.e., number of sausages in the string of sausages) is reached, for the purpose of hanging the string in the smoking process.
The above-described conventional method has presented serious problems in that the cost of providing the shirred casing for application to the stuffing tube is relatively high and, in addition, the rate of productivity is relatively low because a new supply of the shirred casing (the 50-80 foot length of casing shirred or pleated to 15 inches) has to be slipped on the stuffing tube when the previous supply has been exhausted, and the extruder and clipping mechanism are thus idled for substantial periods of time. For example, with the 50-80 foot lengths of shirred casing, there are down times for casing replenishment after approximately 50-80 completed individual sausages ("chubs" or "loaves").